Tuesday, April 23, 2013

|Other Mental health problems experienced by students

As part of our Health and Human Development series (April 2013)



Many International students face a lot of issues when they come to Australia. One of them is stress. The other one is emotional problems tied to being away from home for so long.
These can have an impact on a students study.

1) The academic environment
This might not always be the case. For some students particularly from Asia where they learn by rote and are not used to engaging with other students in a classroom setting. Nor are they used to engaging with the teacher. In China we have learned to respect the master/teacher. But in Australia you can choose to disagree with the lecturer.

2) Sleeping hours and financial worries
Most students work late in the night and study during the daytime, leaving not much time for sleep. They work long hours at night just to make ends meet. You might remember the other article I wrote about International students being ripped off. Well these students worry about their finances hence most of them cannot sleep at night. Some of these students took out loans back home and others of them have had their whole community right behind them so they would want to pay back the community in some way. If RMIT were to provide more scholarships these students would not have to worry about finances. Everyone has had to have declared finances to Immigration, but if Immigration were to be a bit stricter then everyone would be able to meet costs.
Some International students gamble thinking that they have all the money but in the end they go into debt and worry about repaying it back

3) Living life
All students have had to adjust to Melbourne in some ways, some more than others particularly Asian students where there are no maids at home to do the work for you.
Most have had to have learned how to cook and clean or otherwise life would be very expensive. Everything here is so expensive.

4) Health issues
There isn't a lot of counselors in Melbourne. To see one requires a lot of patience. There can be up to a few week wait. Some students are really suicidal when they are by themselves in Melbourne.
OHSC and what is covered is confusing as every policy is different. Students have no idea that they have to pay the gaps.
RMIT's counseling service can be limited especially during the busy periods in a semester. They only have about 3-6 staff in their building and their building is extremely small. Also RMIT doesn't allocate a huge amount of money to student services in which they should.

Students often leave emotional problems until much later as they think that seeing counseling is for the mentally ill. But anyone can see RMIT counseling. All they need to do is to make an appointment.
Some International Students English is not as good so they might take a while to explain things to the doctor or use the wrong words so the doctor might not know what the student has.

 

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